I haven't done enough Dominion ops to get all that I want before picking up this thing. Has anyone figured out whether this is affiliated with the Magian Trials or an upper tier Synergy craftable, or some composite of the two? Has anyone bought this shield yet and tried turning it in to the magian moogle/storage crate?

I've checked here, ffxi wiki and ffxiah and no one has posted anything more helpful than what I found out looking through the Cruor Prospector's wares in Altepa.

Dear god does that ever sound brutal. Was sort of hoping that in line with Aegis costing slightly less than other relics in terms of raw currency numbers that this thing would be slightly easier to get than Empyrean weapons, so much for that though.

Not really an impressive final result if you ask me. When the shield procs, isn't the whole point of it to result in a hit in which you don't take very much damage? 25% of that isn't going to provide you with much MP...

The heightened -MDT on the upgraded forms of Aegis isn't all that useful either. -MDT cap was already easily reached with Shell anyway...

Not really an impressive final result if you ask me. When the shield procs, isn't the whole point of it to result in a hit in which you don't take very much damage? 25% of that isn't going to provide you with much MP...

Depends entirely on if it's based on before or after shield block to calculate MP given. No way to know right now.

Fynlar wrote:

The heightened -MDT on the upgraded forms of Aegis isn't all that useful either. -MDT cap was already easily reached with Shell anyway...

Only if you include an Iron Ram Lance in the build, which sacrifices the physical protection of the shield, plus loses TP if you swap back and forth. Or if you make use of Askar feet/Avalon Breastplate/various head pieces then you give up the MDB/magic evasion you could get with the full Iron Ram set.

Not really an impressive final result if you ask me. When the shield procs, isn't the whole point of it to result in a hit in which you don't take very much damage? 25% of that isn't going to provide you with much MP...

Depends entirely on if it's based on before or after shield block to calculate MP given. No way to know right now.

Fynlar wrote:

The heightened -MDT on the upgraded forms of Aegis isn't all that useful either. -MDT cap was already easily reached with Shell anyway...

Only if you include an Iron Ram Lance in the build, which sacrifices the physical protection of the shield, plus loses TP if you swap back and forth. Or if you make use of Askar feet/Avalon Breastplate/various head pieces then you give up the MDB/magic evasion you could get with the full Iron Ram set.

Fynlar's point was that an Aegis pld could hit cap with just Shell V. i.e. doing trials to increase MDT has zero benefit.

Unless.... cap is lifted for a Aegis?

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Arcari wrote: It's the animation. All Drakesbane does is poke a mob and make lights appear. Ukko's Fury smashes a hole through existence itself to damage an opponent.

The biggest benefit of the new empyrian shield that I see is its size and the mp conversion is more of a bonus. Of course, unless it's nearly blocking 100% of the time, just about any shield could easily replace this one since it's all about /nin right now.

The biggest benefit of the new empyrian shield that I see is its size and the mp conversion is more of a bonus. Of course, unless it's nearly blocking 100% of the time, just about any shield could easily replace this one since it's all about /nin right now.

Well according to a video that's posted on bg now... its blocking around 90% of the time... Not quite 100% but pretty close!

Unless the upgraded aegis breaks the -50% magic dmg taken cap, it would be 100% inferior to a shield like that.

The biggest benefit of the new empyrian shield that I see is its size and the mp conversion is more of a bonus. Of course, unless it's nearly blocking 100% of the time, just about any shield could easily replace this one since it's all about /nin right now.

Well according to a video that's posted on bg now... its blocking around 90% of the time... Not quite 100% but pretty close!

Unless the upgraded aegis breaks the -50% magic dmg taken cap, it would be 100% inferior to a shield like that.

My take is that they're about even. Since most tanks go /nin (especially since SE decided to ***** over /rdm), the block rate isn't as important. This will let you go something other than /nin and take significantly less damage, but what you're fighting will still gain tp and in my experience, if you have a pld holding something, you're typically trying to reduce the NM's tp gain.

Even if Aegis doesn't break the mdt cap, it offers the advantage of significantly reducing magic AoEs that will wipe shadows and is nice for when shell V gets dispelled.

Anyway, I expect all relics will gain a huge boost at 99 since right now they're even more lol than before.

My take is that they're about even. Since most tanks go /nin (especially since SE decided to ***** over /rdm), the block rate isn't as important. This will let you go something other than /nin and take significantly less damage, but what you're fighting will still gain tp and in my experience, if you have a pld holding something, you're typically trying to reduce the NM's tp gain.

Actually with a 100-91% proc rate that is seems to have, + negate en spells, + reduce damage that it does take significantly, its probably minimizes the need for /nin and actually allow blood tanking(not like DDs arent doing that already) but now pld can do it better than it ever did. Thats a massive amount of TP gain youd have, which would need some testing but depending on how well geared your pld is and support can handle, could be better not putting slowII/elegy on the mob and letting it feed you tp, assuming you can handle any TP move it tosses.

Toss in the emp sword and you should be good to go. This doesnt fix pld, but it fixes one of the issues pld was having, and that was it was taking more damage than it should vs what DDs are tanking. A proc rate that high, is exactly what it needed. Now to fix its damage output...

You know, I've been thinking about that lately. What PLD could use is a sort of charged strike. Make it work kinda like sublimation in that it charges up and can be released at once. Give is a decent cool down so it can't be used too frequently (even once a minute might be pushing it, depending on how much it can do, but, then, given how fast TP can come in otherwise, 30 seconds might be just right). If it charged by storing the damage (or even half the damage) that the shield blocked and then could be released in one charge of damage against the enemy. Give it a decent CE and VE rating at let the damage it applies affect enmity, and I think our damage output could be greatly enhanced. It would also encourage more direct bloodtanking since you have to take the damage to charge the ability. Couple that with a shield like this one, and we'd be looking pretty hot.

You know, I've been thinking about that lately. What PLD could use is a sort of charged strike. Make it work kinda like sublimation in that it charges up and can be released at once. Give is a decent cool down so it can't be used too frequently (even once a minute might be pushing it, depending on how much it can do, but, then, given how fast TP can come in otherwise, 30 seconds might be just right). If it charged by storing the damage (or even half the damage) that the shield blocked and then could be released in one charge of damage against the enemy. Give it a decent CE and VE rating at let the damage it applies affect enmity, and I think our damage output could be greatly enhanced. It would also encourage more direct bloodtanking since you have to take the damage to charge the ability. Couple that with a shield like this one, and we'd be looking pretty hot.

That would be a good idea to use with shield bash imo, could have it that every block you do, the damage gets stored, and each time you shield bash, you release a certain % or ratio of that damage that you took, and send it back to the enemy. Obviously Aegis would still have to have the best bash of shields so that would have to go through an augment with said ability/trait. I dont see 500-1k shield bashes being broken for pld when its occuring every 4:10mins....

That's not a bad addition, but it'd have to do more than 1k damage every 4:10. I can unleash five spells back to back on BLU that do about that on average (I've pushed 2k Quad Cont's even without Efflux on mobs weak to piercing, for instance, and 1.5k on mobs NOT weak to piercing). That's why I don't specifically want to tie it to shield bash.

Maybe even give us something similar to WHM's Afflatus Misery that converts damage taken into a boost for a banish spell. Seeing as how WHM's already have that, why not give us a second holy spell that's damage is somehow directly related to the amount of damage blocked by our shields. Give it a 1:30 on recast and have it do up to about a tier V spell in damage if charged sufficiently (Reprisal + Utiliz/Aegis shield users would have an advantage here). Also, have it generate more enmity (maybe give it an enmity +10 bonus or something that would stack with our normal enmity) than a normal nuke. With enough haste, you could be casting every 0:45.

I'm really hoping they have serious plans for PLD. Or, if they thought the things they've implemented WERE their plans, I hope they recognize that they simply haven't been enough to allow us to keep our position. Per SE:

VanaFest 2010 wrote:

With the level cap increase ushering in more powerful enemies than ever before, our highest priority will be to ensure that paladins maintain their current level of effectiveness in their established role.

Source. I've sidelined my PDL. It's still at 85, simply because I have almost no desire to even gear it up right now. Anything I've done on PLD lately has been more effective on BLU OR on my brother's THF. It definitely has not maintained its current level of effectiveness.

This probably needs its own topic, however. Maybe I'll start one up soon.